


Seven Minutes

by cj2017



Category: Rizzoli & Isles
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-22
Updated: 2010-11-22
Packaged: 2017-10-14 10:44:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/148413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cj2017/pseuds/cj2017
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hurt/comfort. Ep cont. for When The Gun Goes… So big ol’ spoilers for anyone who’s not seen the finale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Never one to leave a bandwagon un-jumped on and just in case the Powers that Be decide to skip ahead at the start of season 2, I thought I’d have a go at filling in the gaps. Huge thanks to Cat (feroxargentea ) my long-suffering beta. My lovely American beta (the one who takes out all my unwitting Britishisms!) isn’t in this fandom, so feel free to shout out any glaring errors and I’ll get them changed.  
> Feedback always welcome.  
> Disclaimer: Not mine. Please don't sue.

Jane Rizzoli’s life had always teetered along the fine line that divides courage and sheer stupidity. In the eighth grade she had climbed onto the roof of a derelict building to rescue a stray kitten. One wrong step had plunged her and the kitten through a shattered tile to land a full story below. Her friends had eventually found her, covered in dust and filth, the kitten curled contentedly on her chest. Her leg had been fractured in two places but she had managed not to make a sound; she hadn’t wanted to scare the cat. Years later she had followed a scream into a darkened basement without waiting for back-up. It was a decision that had brought her more scars, matching, crescent-shaped etchings on her hands that itched when she was nervous and ached deep in the bone when the weather turned. She had tried to be careful since then, had tried to be more circumspect, to take the time to weigh up her options and reign in the headstrong impulses that tended to get her into so much trouble. But there were still occasions when, despite all of her good intentions, it just didn’t work out like that.

In the heat of the mid-afternoon sun, as she lay where she had fallen with her face pressed to Marino’s arm, Jane breathed in the cloying stink of crappy cologne and violent death and wondered which side of the line she had landed on this time.

A stunned couple of seconds passed, sounds muted by the proximity of the gunshot, before she heard the rapid tapping of heels heading towards her and then felt Maura’s hand resting warm and clammy on her shoulder.

“Jane? Oh God.” Maura’s voice was high-pitched with fear. Without thinking, Jane tried to move, to roll over and reassure her best friend, but nothing really cooperated and her chest heaved with panic because if Maura was here then she wasn’t with Frankie and all of this had been for nothing.

Kneeling on the sidewalk, Maura understood in an instant that the distress creasing Jane’s face had nothing to do with the bullet she had just fired through herself and everything to do with the reason she had resorted to such a dire course of action in the first place.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. The medics are with him. SWAT escorted them in.” Maura watched the terror ease from Jane’s eyes, to be replaced by pain when she turned Jane gently onto her back. “Oh honey, what did you do?”

Blood already covered the front of Jane’s shirt, but a steady trail was dripping down onto the road and Maura quickly realized that the exit wound was the main source of the hemorrhage. To her left, Korsak was screaming for an ambulance, and above her Frost’s murmur of apology undercut the older man’s demands as he disentangled Marino’s body and dragged it away. She let them both do their jobs and focused on hers.

“Jane, I need to try and stop this bleeding.” The nervous uncertainty that had stilled her hand with Frankie was nowhere to be seen; her fingers moved firmly over the smooth skin of Jane’s back until they found the ragged mess of flesh slightly higher up her torso than the entrance wound.

“Here, use this.” She looked up as Frost handed her his shirt. She nodded in thanks, balling it up and pressing it hard against the gaping hole that still pulsed blood at an alarming rate. Jane was gasping for breath, trying to control the pain and stop herself from crying out. Maura forced herself to ignore the sounds and concentrate on the practicalities: ABC, the fundamentals of first aid. She took a deep breath and clamped her palm over the smaller wound in Jane’s upper abdomen. Jane gave a quiet moan of protest in response to the added discomfort but made no attempt to push away, instead craning her neck upwards to see what Maura was doing and then sagging back against the concrete.

“Maura.” She licked her dry lips, frustrated at the weakness contained in that one word. “I’m sorry.”

Maura tried to smile but it fell well short of her eyes and her bottom lip began to tremble. “You’re going to be fine, Jane. Just try and keep still.”

“No,” Jane shook her head, her hand gesturing vaguely. “Sorry about your dress.”

Maura glanced down at the front of her dress where it was already liberally splattered with Frankie’s blood, and then at the fresh stains soaking into the fabric gathered at her knees. Her face crumpled and she closed her eyes, tears running down her nose to drip into Jane’s hair.

“I was never really sure I liked the colors anyway.” Her voice cracked and broke as the wail of sirens rounded the corner.

“Mmm, you look pretty in blue.”

“I do?” Maura watched Jane nod in confirmation. Her lips were quirked upwards into a faint grin, but her face was ashen and damp with sweat, her breathing rapid and shallow, and Maura could still feel her blood oozing thickly through Frost’s shirt.

“Okay then. When you get fixed up,” Maura forced levity into her words even as she pushed down as hard as she dared, her arms aching with the effort, “you can buy me something in blue.”

“I promise.” Jane brought her hand up to cover Maura’s, her blood sticking their fingers together. She shook her head and closed her eyes as a thought suddenly occurred to her. “Jesus, ma’s never gonna let me hear the fuckin’ end of this.”

Maura gave a strangled laugh that immediately turned into sobs. She felt Jane’s fingers curl around her own. The slamming of doors made her look up sharply: paramedics, laden with kit, were running towards them. She swayed slightly as a rush of relief made her light-headed.

“It’s okay ma’am, you can let go now.” A young EMT with kind eyes lifted Frost’s shirt away. She didn’t say a word when Maura kept hold of Jane’s hand, but just nodded to confirm that Maura wasn’t in their way and started to sort through the equipment she would need.

“No radial palp,” she muttered to the paramedic. Her fingers pressed firmly against Jane’s wrist and then moved to her innner elbow. “Got a brachial, though.”

The paramedic was connecting an oxygen mask to a portable cylinder, his brow creased with concern as he considered the amount of blood his patient had already lost. “Sats are only 91%. Get an Asherman on that entrance wound. Pressure dressing on her back. IV access, fluids, load and go,” he said, reaching for his stethoscope.

Jane’s eyes widened as she tried and failed to follow the conversation. “Maur… In English?”

“Sorry, Detective.” The paramedic hesitated, one half of his steth already in his ear. “We need to stop you bleeding and bring your blood pressure back up with an IV.” His hand rested on Jane’s right side, assessing the rise and fall of her chest. He nodded as if confirming his own suspicions. “I think the bullet had collapsed your lung. We’re gonna use a special dressing to correct that, and then we’ll get you to the hospital real quick. That sound okay?”

Jane’s gaze flitted to Maura’s as if to check that really was okay. It was only when Maura squeezed her hand that she nodded.

“Good.” The paramedic placed the diaphragm of his steth against Jane’s chest. “Take a deep breath for me.”

Jane knew that wasn’t going to happen but she tried anyway, grimacing as the pressure in her chest immediately restricted her effort.

“Okay, that’s fine.” The paramedic’s tone implied that that certainly wasn’t fine, but he had a pretty good poker face as he looped the oxygen mask over her head and secured it into place. “This’ll help, and I’ll get you something for the pain as soon as we’ve gotten some fluids into you.”

Looking up at Maura, Jane tried to ignore the suffocating sensation of the mask and the hands that were hurriedly attempting to dress her injuries. Maura’s poker face was, somewhat predictably, less convincing, but she managed a weak smile and Jane knew exactly how much that had just cost the woman who fainted at the thought of telling a lie.

“Sharp stick here.” The pain of the needle sliding smoothly into her wrist distracted Jane from the guilt that was threatening to undo her. The paramedic muttered something inaudible but unmistakeably relieved as he secured it into place and connected it up to the IV. “Run it wide open, Amy.”

“Yeah, I got it.”

“I can take that.” Maura reached out for the bag of fluid, but another hand took it instead and she felt Korsak settle beside her. Without needing to be told, he squeezed the bag to speed up the rate of the infusion. She smiled gratefully and dropped her hand back to where it had been, stroking slowly across Jane’s forehead.

“Frankie beat you to the hospital, Rizzoli.”

Jane’s eyes opened a crack. “He did?” It was only a mumble beneath the mask but it was loud enough for them to hear. “Yeah, they were heading straight into surgery with him.”

“No-one…” she pulled in a breath, fogging up the mask, “you didn’t…”

“Tell him about your little stunt out here?” He shook his head, not quite sure whether he wanted to wrap his arms around her or throttle her. “No, we told him you were fine, because you will be.” He shrugged. “So it was only half a lie.”

She let out a laugh but it turned into a cough and her eyes filled with tears.

“Hey, can’t you give her anything for that?”

The paramedic was setting up the gurney but he shook his head at Korsak’s gruff question. “Not yet. Once her pressure’s up a little I can give her some morphine, but right now there’s a risk of her crashing.”

“Shit.” Korsak looked like he wished he’d never asked. He squeezed the IV bag harder and winced inwardly at Maura’s stricken expression.

“Can we have some hands here?” the EMT asked the largely uniformed crowd. It seemed as if half the Boston police force stepped forward, and the few that were closest carried Jane carefully across to the waiting gurney, following the instructions of the medics.

Left on her own, Maura stood up slowly, her legs leaden and cramping. She leaned without protest on the arm that Frost offered her and stared at the deep brown stain cascading down the sidewalk they had just moved away from.

“Are you okay, Doctor Isles? You’re not hurt?”

“No, I’m not hurt,” she said. She was shaking, the adrenaline rush leaving her in an instant as the gurney was secured into the back of the ambulance. One door closed and she was wondering whether she would have to hitch a ride in a squad car when the EMT stepped down and gestured in her direction.

“Are you Maura?”

“Yes.” She blinked, straightening up quickly. “Yes.”

“She’s been asking for you.” The EMT held a hand out to help her into the back of the ambulance. “Are you okay without your shoes?”

Maura felt the rough floor beneath her toes and for the first time realized that she was barefoot. She had no idea when she had kicked her heels off or how she had gotten the graze that stood out as an angry red line on her ankle.

“I’m fine.” She moved to the seat that the EMT indicated and leaned forward to take Jane’s hand in hers. “I don’t need them.”

The EMT nodded and shut the door, blocking out the daylight to leave only the stark, artificial light of the ambulance interior. Jane hadn’t reacted to any of the activity going on around her. She lay propped onto her side, her eyes closed, and seemed relatively comfortable. Maura watched her heart rhythm dance quickly across the EKG screen and allowed herself to relax slightly.

“How is she?” Maura directed her question to the paramedic who was rechecking the dressings for any sign that the bleeding was worsening. When he had finished he peeled his bloodied gloves off and wiped his hands dry before pulling on a fresh pair.

“The fluids brought her pressure up a little. Enough for me to give her a small dose of morphine. It’s knocked her out, which was kinda the idea.” The ambulance pulled away and began to gain speed. Multiple sirens sounded as the police ensured that its route was clear. “She really shoot the bad guy through herself?” The paramedic tucked another blanket around his patient, his expression bordering on incredulous.

Maura sighed. “Yes, she really did.”

“No shit.” He laughed in disbelief. “Bet he never saw that coming.”

Maura stroked the limp fingers that rested in her bloodied palm. “No,” she said softly. “It’s very unlikely that he would have.” She had known. As soon as she had seen Jane wrestling the gun into position she had known exactly what Jane had planned to do. In those terrible seconds she had watched Jane fall and wondered whether the shot had killed her. It had been desperately stupid and reckless and utterly selfless and they were going to have a serious discussion about Jane never doing it again just as soon as she was awake and at least semi-coherent.

“We’re only about seven minutes out.” The paramedic was standing up, balanced precariously with his knees hugging the gurney as he swapped out the IV fluids and set a fresh bag running. “They’ll be waiting for her.”

“Thank you.” Maura leaned her head back, exhausted. High-flow oxygen hissed, the sirens howled and the EMT swore loudly at a driver who wasn’t quick enough in getting out of her way. Maura blocked it all out, listening only to the sound of her best friend’s rattling breaths as the clock on the wall steadily counted seven minutes down, one by one.


	2. Chapter 2

“Small caliber through-and-through, right upper quadrant. GCS 10, BP 76/40, tachy at around one thirty. She had reduced breath sounds on the right so we’ve used an Asherman seal. It’s not helped much. Sats are 94% on 15 liters.” The paramedic paused and pointed to the bottom corner of the plastic transfer board that he and the medics were sliding beneath Jane. “Amy, tuck the corner under a little more. That’s better.” He looked down at his patient, trying to remember what he had missed from his handover. “Uh, she’s had one liter of LRS en route and 5mg morphine. I’ve done my best with her back but it’s still bleeding through.”

The doctor heading up the trauma team nodded in acknowledgement. “Okay,” she said in a voice that effortlessly commanded attention. “On my count. One, two, three…”

“What the?! Jesus!” The sudden movement made Jane’s eyes fly open. Her hands reached out to tear the oxygen mask from her face as her first instinct to fight whatever was hurting her shouted louder than the one telling her that that would only make things worse.

“Woah, okay, so I underestimated.” The paramedic raised a wry eyebrow as he tried to hold onto a flailing hand. “Up that GCS to a 15.” He looked over his shoulder to address the woman standing by the door of the Trauma Room. “Doctor Isles?” Maura had formally introduced herself as the ambulance had careened its way through the city streets, and he emphasized her full title, attempting to ensure that her presence in the room wasn’t frowned upon. She had sensibly stayed out of the way, and so far no-one had tried to make her leave.

When there were no objections to the paramedic’s request she gave a relieved nod, hurrying over to his side and taking Jane’s hand as he stepped back.

“Hey, it’s okay, it’s okay. You’re okay.” Her voice immediately cut through the adrenaline spike that had just made Jane send a tray of IV supplies clattering to the floor. It was the same tone Maura had used on countless occasions when late casework combined with alcohol or just comfortable laziness had seen her and Jane share the same bed. Jane rarely remembered her nightmares and Maura never told her how often she woke sweating and trembling with a scream she had only half-managed to suppress.

In a matter of seconds, Jane stopped struggling against the medical team and began instead to concentrate on controlling her breathing. She clung onto Maura’s hand and closed out the unfamiliar voices, the impersonal touches, and the pain that was too severe to be managed by the small amount of morphine she had been given.

“You’re in the hospital.” Maura watched as Jane slowly relaxed back into the pillow. “They had to move you off the gurney.”

“Coulda warned me.” Jane pulled a face as a nurse reattached her oxygen, but that minor irritation paled into insignificance a second later and her entire body stiffened, her free hand gripping onto the cold metal of the bed’s railing. “Oh God, what the hell?”

Maura looked across to the doctor who was peeling away the soaked dressings wrapped around Jane’s torso. The doctor’s eyes widened inadvertently before she handed a clean dressing to a nurse with orders to “press down hard” and then stepped into Jane’s line of vision.

“You’re bleeding all over my floor, Detective,” she said with a smile that immediately made Jane want to apologize and ask for a mop. She injected morphine into Jane’s IV, further endearing herself to her patient. “So we’re going to get you to the surgeons as soon as we’ve done a quick assessment in here. Is the pain any easier?”

“Mmm.” Jane nodded, her eyes closing as the drug started to take effect.

“Good. Think we can get through this without you trashing my ER?”

Another nod and Jane forced her eyes open to see the doctor already turning to fire instructions at her team. Maura pulled a blanket up beneath Jane’s chin. Jane’s shirt had been cut away and she was shivering uncontrollably, her teeth chattering.

“It’s just shock,” Maura said, as if it were nothing that couldn’t be fixed, as if it were nothing at all to worry about. Desperate circumstances seemed to be improving her ability to maintain a façade.

Still shuddering but much less violently, Jane mouthed “thank you” beneath the mask. She could hear the doctors discussing an urgent chest tube, then someone stuck a needle in her arm with only the most perfunctory of warnings, and an alarmed voice loudly registered a drop in her blood pressure. She let it all fade into the background and focused her energy on staying awake. The drugs were making that almost impossible, and she was drifting, pleasantly anesthetized, when her eyes suddenly shot open. She pulled her oxygen mask down around her chin again and ignored the disapproving scowl that a young nurse shot in her direction.

“Will you feed Jo?” she whispered urgently and then bit down hard on her lip as all of Maura’s hard-won composure seemed to vanish in an instant. “Oh hey, just while I’m in here.” She reached out a clumsy hand that came nowhere near the tears spilling down Maura’s cheeks. “Oh God, I’m sorry.” She vaguely remembered making an earlier apology, but suspected that there wasn’t a big enough forfeit in the world for what she had put her friend through in the last few hours.

Maura wiped her eyes dry with the back of her hand. “Done nothing but cry on you,” she said with a self-conscious smile. As she considered Jane’s request her brow slowly wrinkled with puzzlement. “Would Jo eat fresh chicken?” Having tried and failed to think of a recognizable dog food, she was now genuinely baffled. The only pet she had ever had was Bass and she was pretty sure that dogs didn’t eat strawberries.

“Maura, she’s a dog.” Jane tried not to laugh; it hurt too much. “She likes eating my sofa cushions. I think she’ll be fine with kibble…”

~ ~ ~

“Take as long as you want, honey. These should fit and I’ll try to find you a pair of shoes.”

With a murmur of thanks, Maura took the set of scrubs the nurse was holding out. The nurse had waited at the elevator until the doors had closed to block Jane from sight, and had then firmly ushered Maura towards the staff locker room. Maura had gone without a protest, relieved to find someone who would tell her what to do and temporarily absolve her from the burden of having to think for herself.

She didn’t want to think. As she stepped out of her dress, she didn’t want to think that it was Jane’s blood that made the fabric so brittle. She didn’t want to think as she scrubbed her hands clean and watched the water swirl red against the porcelain. Before taking Jane to the OR, the doctor had told Maura that the bullet had torn a hole in Jane’s liver, and she really didn’t want to think about that.

Stepping beneath the lukewarm spray, Maura closed her eyes, lifted her face to the water and let it pound over her. It was so tempting to stay hidden in there with the door locked and the water running. Outside there would be statements and interviews, the untamed grief of Angela Rizzoli and platitudes from concerned colleagues. But there would also be updates from the surgeons who were currently attempting to save the two youngest Rizzoli siblings.

Maura twisted the dial and the water sputtered to a stop. She ran the scratchy, institutional towel hard across her skin and combed her hair with her fingers. It fell loosely around her face, damp and unstyled. Her face was pale, her eyes bruised from the tears and the stress. On any other day she would have been horrified. Today, she barely afforded herself a second glance. She unlocked the door and walked out into the locker room.

“Oh, you look better.” The nurse was waiting with coffee and a pair of the plastic OR shoes so beloved of surgeons. “These were all I could find.”

“They’re fine, thank you.” Maura slipped the shoes on, cradled the cup of coffee in both hands, and followed the nurse into the corridor.

~ ~ ~

Frost and Korsak were taking it in turns to pace across the small room that had been specially designed to offer privacy to the relatives of the critically ill. It wasn’t as if they were intentionally coordinating their movements, but neither seemed able to sit and wait at the side of the other. For the last ten minutes, Korsak had had the floor. The tread of his boots was heavy on the tiles – eight steps to the door, a quick pause to peer through the blinds covering the window, and then eight steps back again. Sitting in the corner with a blanket draped around her shoulders, Maura drew comfort from the predictable routine.

“What is that now?” Korsak stopped suddenly, his rough voice fracturing the silence. “What? Three hours? What the hell they doin’ in there?”

The last update on Jane’s condition had been over an hour ago – she was still hemorrhaging but the surgeon was making steady progress. Already out of the OR, Frankie had been moved to the High Dependency Unit. His ruptured spleen had been removed and a new drain sited to allow his lung to heal. Angela and Frank Rizzoli had left to sit by his bedside.

“Three hours, forty-five minutes,” Frost said, without needing to look at his watch. “Feels like longer.”

“Yeah,” Korsak slumped into his chair, all of his nervous energy abruptly deserting him. He sounded old and very weary. “Yeah, it does.”

They fell back into silence. For another seemingly endless hour, the only sounds came from beyond the door – PA calls for staff members, the squeak of a trolley’s unoiled wheels and the chatter of passing visitors. When it finally came, the quiet knock on the door was so unexpected that the surgeon had stepped into the room before anyone inside had reacted.

“Mr and Mrs Rizzoli?” He only looked up from the piece of paper in his hand when Maura answered him.

“They’re with Jane’s brother in the HDU.”

“Oh.” For a moment he hesitated, his exhaustion hindering his ability to make sense of Maura’s information. “Oh, of course.” He checked the paper again. “Are you Doctor Isles?”

“Yes.” Shrugging off the blanket, she crossed the space between them and offered her hand. “How is she?”

Frost and Korsak were also standing, one on either side of her, so close she could feel Korsak holding his breath.

The surgeon’s face softened into a smile. “She’s doing okay. Better than we expected, really.”

Korsak’s breath whooshed out of him and he sat down onto the nearest chair. Her hand gripping his shoulder, Maura just about managed to stay on her feet, and she welcomed the arm that Frost surreptitiously wrapped around her waist.

“She’s okay?” Maura’s throat closed on the question.

The surgeon gestured to the chairs and waited until they were seated before he sat down himself. “She’s critical but stable. We performed a hepatorrhaphy – that’s a suture to repair a tear in her liver,” he translated for the benefit of the two detectives who both nodded gratefully. “She has a chest tube to correct a right-sided hemopneumothorax and her right kidney is badly contused. Given the extent of the initial hemorrhage, I expected worse. She’s not out of the woods – there’s always the possibility of infection or a rebleed – but she’s stable at the moment.”

“Can we see her?”

“Is she awake?”

The questions came in almost simultaneously from Frost and Korsak, both already poised to stand.

The surgeon shook his head, raising his hands to keep the two men seated. “Detective Rizzoli is in the ITU. I’m afraid it’s family members only. Doctor Isles?” He looked over to where Maura was sitting with a stunned expression on her face as she processed the ramifications of everything he had told them.

“Maura,” she corrected automatically.

“Maura.” He paused until she nodded at him, and then passed her the sheet of paper he was holding. “You’re listed as Detective Rizzoli’s next of kin.”

“I am?” Maura studied the pro forma, skimming through the preliminary details on Jane’s admission document until she found the relevant section. Angela and Frank Rizzoli occupied the first box reserved for next of kin. The second contained her own name and contact details. “I wasn’t aware of that,” she said quietly. Jane had been her own next of kin for a couple of years now, absent parents and no siblings making the decision an easy one. She had had no idea that Jane had afforded her the same status.

“You can sit with her if you’d like.” At some point unnoticed by Maura, the surgeon had walked to the door.

Maura nodded quickly. “Yes, of course.” She stood to follow him out but then turned back to the two detectives she was leaving behind. “I’ll tell her you’re here. She’ll know that already but I’ll tell her.” Barely able to get the words out, she left the room without waiting for them to reply.

~ ~ ~

The elevator climbed steadily, the lights on its display illuminating intermittently as it passed the lower floors. It stopped once for a man and a woman who entered bearing pink gift-wrapped presents and a balloon announcing It’s a Girl in lurid fluorescence. They beamed proudly at Maura, who smiled politely at them and then tried not to show her frustration when they stepped off a floor later.

The surgeon shook his head in despair. “And we wonder why there’s an obesity crisis.”

He and Maura were the only ones to exit on the floor for the ITU. Walking beside him, tracking the signs highlighting the different departments, she felt a flutter of nerves beginning to make her palms sweat and her stomach churn. As if picking up on her train of thought, he slowed his pace.

“We’re keeping her on the ventilator for at least another twelve hours,” he said.

“She’s still unconscious then.” It was nothing that Maura hadn’t expected, but confirmation of the fact still felt like someone had punched her in the guts.

“Yes, she is. Her lung took a bad hit. The vent allows us to control how far it expands, which is giving it a chance to heal.”

Maura looked up at him, a smile unexpectedly touching the edge of her lips. “You want her to stay in bed for a while?”

He nodded, his expression slightly confused.

“Then you might want to keep her unconscious for longer.”

His eyes widened. “That bad, huh?”

“Oh God, worse.” She laughed quietly, only half-joking.

Four days after Hoyt’s first assault, Jane had been back at work, her hands so swathed in bandages that she couldn’t actually hold a gun, or a pen, or type out a report. In the end she had spent hours in the autopsy bay with Maura, who hadn’t told her to go home and rest up or nagged her to discuss her deepest, darkest fears with the shrink. They had swapped stories while Maura worked, eaten Chinese with spoons when everyone else had gone home, and ended up as best friends.

The surgeon swiped his security pass and then paused with his hand on the door of the ITU.

“You okay?”

Maura nodded without hesitation. “I’m fine.”

He held the door open and she walked through.


	3. Chapter 3

When Maura was ten, her father had taken it upon himself to fix Christmas lights to their snow-covered roof. One false step and he had fallen, his skull shattering against the icy ground. He had spent a week in an ITU, where Maura had been allowed one short visit. Sitting at his bedside, she had stared and stared at his eyes, too swollen to open, and at the ugly tube protruding from his mouth. He hadn’t moved or spoken or in any way acknowledged her presence. Despite her mother’s obvious disappointment, she had refused to hold his hand – there had been nothing recognizable of her father in that bed.

More than twenty years later, the otherworldly atmosphere she remembered from that ITU hadn’t altered. The lights were still muted, the voices still hushed. Technology, however, had advanced, and Maura walked past cubicles where the patients seemed more machine than human. They slept or with drugged, expressionless eyes they watched her walk by, as the miracle of modern medicine either restored them to health or, when every avenue had finally been exhausted, kept them in comfortable oblivion until it was all over. Relatives sat in bleary-eyed vigil waiting to learn which way the coin-toss would fall.

With so little opportunity for relatives to speak to loved ones, the background noise was dominated by the recurrent sounding of alarms: a rise in a pulse rate, a fall in an arterial pressure, a syringe-driver malfunctioning or a tube dislodged. The doctor in Maura drew comfort from the hair-trigger sensitivity of the machines and the unhurried efficiency of the medical staff. The patients were nursed on a one-to-one basis, the surgeons and specialists always close at hand.

“Okay then,” the surgeon said quietly, pausing with his palm flat against the cubicle door. “It looks pretty bad. It is pretty bad, but the fact that she’s made it this far…” He shook his head. “Something tells me she’s quite stubborn.”

Maura laughed, the sound faintly despairing. “You have no idea.”

He held the door open for her and then surprised her by stepping back.

“I have some notes to write up. If you need me, I’ll be at the desk.”

“Thank you.” Her eyes were already straying beyond him, but she was sincerely grateful for his tact. The door closed with a muffled click as he walked away.

For a second, Maura didn’t move. The soft tread of the surgeon’s footsteps faded, and she stood frozen to the spot. Her passage through the ITU had prepared her for the machines and the tubes and the intermittent hiss of the ventilator. What it hadn’t prepared her for was the sight of Jane Rizzoli lying so utterly still. Despite Jane’s protestations and her more recent attempts to blame Jo-Friday, Maura knew from first-hand experience how violently Jane slept. Her fists would lash out, her legs kicking indiscriminately and her teeth grinding against each other. The horrors she encountered in the daylight regularly chased her into the night, and during a bad case she would often turn up to work looking worse than if she hadn’t managed any sleep at all. She appeared to be sleeping peacefully now, but Maura knew that was solely due to anesthesia and strong narcotics. Stepping closer, the illusion was shattered even further by the pallor of her face and the regular breaths that were completely reliant on the ventilator. The rise and fall of her chest was slightly uneven as the vent fed shallower breaths to her right side, a testament to the injury she had suffered and the lengths the medics were going to in order to allow her to heal.

“Hey, sweetheart.” Maura kissed her forehead gently. Terms of endearment had never come easily to Maura. Her family had always frowned upon overt displays of affection or emotion, but that reserved part of her character was something else Jane had steadily been chipping away at. For reasons Maura had never quite managed to fathom, she was perfectly comfortable with Jane’s tactile nature and devil-may-care attitude to personal space.

Having pulled one of the chairs closer to the bedside, Maura sank into it and took careful hold of the fingers of Jane’s right hand. They were one of the few parts of her body that seemed safe for Maura to touch. There were lines and tubes everywhere: an arterial line, a central line, and a number of peripheral IV lines. Some dripped fluid or blood, others registered the changes those fluids were making to Jane’s vitals. A surgical drain hung low on the bedrail alongside a chest tube and a catheter, their contents all deeply stained with blood.

With a shudder, Maura tried not to dwell on the fact that she recognized the various pieces of equipment solely because of the evidence they left behind on corpses. Those people whom the ITU could not save would occasionally come to her for autopsy. On her preliminary examination, she would record the fresh scars and livid contusions which told of the extraordinary but ultimately futile measures that had been made in an effort to preserve life. Nausea made cold sweat break out on her forehead, and she closed her eyes against the unbidden and terrible image of Jane’s corpse laid bare on her slab.

“Don’t you dare die on me,” she whispered fervently. “I can forgive you all this,” her voice broke, tears hot on her cheeks, “but don’t you dare die.”

~ ~ ~

“Frankie’s okay. Apparently your mother already brought him soup.” Maura heard a chuckle from the nurse who was recording Jane’s vitals on a vast chart, but there was no reaction from Jane. That didn’t surprise or deter her, and she continued her monolog. “Korsak and Frost are behaving themselves. Frost was called back to give a statement but he won’t be gone for long. Marissa is feeding Jo, just while I’m here. I thought I’d keep you company tonight.” It was actually already very early in the morning, but for once Maura decided not to trouble herself with semantics. She rubbed her eyes, trying to rid them of the grittiness that was making them sting so badly.

“You should get some sleep yourself.” The nurse had looked up, her pen tapping against the chart. “I heard what happened. It was on the news.”

“Oh.” Maura hadn’t even thought of that. Hidden away in the hospital, it had been easy for her to forget that the day’s events would have been a major news story.

“Way they told it, you both had a pretty rough day.”

Maura stroked her thumb across the back of Jane’s fingers. “We did.”

“Can I get you anything?”

“I’m fine. Thank you, though.”

The nurse nodded, her hand resting briefly on Maura’s arm before she dimmed the overhead light and left the cubicle.

Numbers: blue, red, and green, their figures constantly changing but only ever so slightly, cast a soft glow across the sheets.

“They’re letting you sleep for a little longer, Jane.” Maura watched the numbers flicker hypnotically: 96/60, 114, 97%, 12. The last one never altered; it was the number of breaths per minute the vent was set to. She yawned, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. “It’s only because the nurses are too busy to keep chasing you back into bed,” she added with a smile. Her eyes felt so heavy, and she closed them, telling herself that she would just rest for a couple of minutes.

The nurse returned with coffee and a sandwich, took one look at Maura, and put the snack down on the bedside table. After draping a blanket over Maura, she set about administering the drugs that her patient was due. An IV pump alarmed as a tube became kinked, and the nurse swore beneath her breath, correcting the problem within seconds but not before Maura had jerked awake.

“Jane?” She looked around, momentarily disoriented, before her gaze settled on the nurse. “Oh.”

“Sorry, she’s fine. Damn thing just got a bit twisted. You go back to sleep, hon.”

“No, I can’t. I just…” Maura shook her head. “Was I asleep?” Her fingers toyed with the edge of the blanket; she had no idea where it had come from. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“You don’t sleep and you’ll be no good to her when she wakes up,” the nurse said reasonably. “She’s gonna be too weak to scratch her own nose when they bring her ’round.” She spoke with the absolute certainty of someone who had worked the unit for years, and Maura was sensible enough to take her advice.

“You’ll wake me if anything happens?”

“Of course I will.”

Leaning her head back, Maura listened to the steady whoosh and hiss of the ventilator. Fifteen seconds passed – three breaths. She never heard the fourth.

~ ~ ~

Angela Rizzoli was crying. Her eyes were already red-rimmed and swollen, and she was walking the width of the ITU cubicle like a tiger pacing a cage.

“I don’t understand,” she said again, her voice plaintive. “Was she trying to kill herself? She had no reason to do that.”

Maura sipped the coffee Frank had handed her. He shrugged when she looked at him for help. This conversation had obviously been on a loop for some time now.

“She wasn’t trying to kill herself.” There was no trace of doubt in Maura’s voice. “She was trying to get help to Frankie. She knew he was in trouble.”

“They were already in there!” Angela spun around, gazed at her daughter, and sniffled. “They were already in there.” The sniffles turned into sobs.

“She didn’t know that, Ange.” Frank stood up and ushered her into a chair.

She turned to Maura. “We had to tell Frankie. He wanted to know why she hadn’t been to see him. He’s breaking his heart.”

“He’s a strong boy, Ange.”

She switched around to face her husband, dabbing her face with a damp Kleenex. “His heart is broken,” she insisted.

“He’s strong,” Frank said again, more quietly this time, almost to himself. He reached out and gripped his daughter’s hand. “He’s strong like his sister.”

~ ~ ~

“She won’t remember this,” the anesthetist explained kindly. “She’ll only just be out of the anesthesia.”

Maura nodded, her heart pounding with fear. The Rizzolis had left over an hour ago, to sleep and shower and pick up things Frankie would need. Had they still been here, she was certain they would all have been asked to leave the cubicle, but the doctor and the anesthetist were used to her presence, and they hadn’t even suggested that she might be better waiting outside.

The cubicle was crowded with medical staff, the chairs pushed aside to make room for a crash cart. Maura stood by the wall and watched as the syringe driver with the milky fluid running through it was turned off. For the first few seconds, nothing happened. After thirty seconds, Jane tried to swallow. The attempt failed miserably, and – subconsciously holding her own breath – Maura watched as Jane began to fight the vent.

“Good girl. Jane, open your eyes for me.” The anesthetist flipped a switch, and the vent sighed once and quieted. He disconnected it from the tube in Jane’s throat and then used a syringe to draw air from the cuff that kept the tube in place. “Okay, breathe in as deeply as you can.”

Jane tried, blinking in confusion but following the instructions regardless. The tube came out in a rush of blood-speckled saliva, and she coughed and gagged as a nurse suctioned the worst of it away.

“Deep breaths. I know that hurts, but try.”

Jane shook her head, her chest burning as she sucked air in. She could hear multiple voices, none of them familiar and all of them speaking in terms far too technical for her addled brain to process. She figured out that 92% wasn’t a good score because someone put the oxygen mask that she hated back onto her. She would have sworn at them if her throat hadn’t felt like it was lined with sandpaper. The oxygen in the mask surprised her by being warm and humidified, and she decided to say thank-you by obliging the voices and taking a couple of deeper breaths.

“Ninety-five percent. Better.”

She smiled fuzzily, and then heard someone mention physical therapy and coughing, which made the words “fuck” and “off” dance across the tip of her tongue. She was opening her mouth to try an experiment with speech, when small, familiar fingers closed around hers.

“Don’t swear at the doctors, Jane.” A smile played around the edges of Maura’s lips, brightening her face just about enough to mask the exhaustion in her eyes. “They’re the ones deciding how much morphine to give you.”

Jane licked her lips but then shook her head in frustration, too doped-up to reply.

“Go back to sleep,” she heard Maura say. “I’ll be here when you wake up.” The drugs weren’t giving her too much of a choice. Reassured that Maura was sticking around to watch her back, she let them pull her back under.

~ ~ ~

Maura’s second set of scrubs were pale blue and slightly frayed around the edges as if they had been through an industrial wash a few times too many. She didn’t care. They were comfortable, they stretched when she sat with her legs curled up beneath her, and they were cool in the stifling warmth of the ITU.

“And to think I once complained about working in a wrinkled dress,” she said lightly. Jane didn’t stir but her heart rate increased slightly, as it had done on a couple of occasions when Maura had spoken to her. According to the surgeon, she was holding her own, a phrase Maura had always previously disliked for its vagueness but which made perfect sense to her now. Jane was breathing for herself, she was responding to the medication, and so far showing no signs of infection. Earlier, Korsak had drawn the same conclusion when Maura had spoken to him on the phone.

“So, she’s holding her own,” he had said, before turning to broadcast his news to anyone and everyone within earshot. Realizing he was at the station, Maura had smiled at the faint sound of cheering in the background.

Outside the cubicle, Maura could hear voices and low laughter as the nurses changed over shifts. Without looking at her watch, she knew it was 9 pm. That was how time was tracked in the windowless cubicle: shift changeovers, medication rounds, doctors’ rounds and the occasional reminders from staff that she really did need to eat something. Within the next five minutes, the nurse on the night shift would be in to check on her patient. Reopening her medical journal, Maura found the piece entitled Liver trauma: Operative and Non-operative Management and continued to read.

~ ~ ~

There were white ceiling tiles. For a long moment, Jane squinted, trying to focus and then trying to work out exactly why the hell she was waking up to nasty white institutional ceiling tiles. The answer, when it came, was anything but subtle, as an ill-advised attempt to move set a red-hot pain tearing through her abdomen and several alarms sounded simultaneously.

“Shit.” She panted for air, her body rigid. The pain gradually began to fade, sinking beneath a layer of drugs to leave only a residual ache as a warning not to do anything besides lying still and behaving herself.

“Jane?” Maura’s voice sounded hazy with sleep.

Jane carefully turned her head towards it. “Hey.” The word was barely recognizable as speech, and she rolled her eyes before trying again. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Maura came to stand beside the bed. She was smiling, but her expression was wary, as if this had happened a few times already and she was reluctant to allow herself to be too optimistic.

“I think I annoyed something,” Jane mumbled, her fingers waving vaguely towards one of the monitors, which subsequently began to sound a second, slightly higher tone. She managed a look that fell part-way between sheepish and amused.

Maura’s smile broadened. “Yes, you did.” The cacophony was slowly dying down. “Do you know where you are?”

Jane raised an eyebrow. “Not Kansas.” She swallowed and winced. “Hospital.” Her eyes widened as fragmented memories began to coalesce. “Frankie?”

“He’s fine,” Maura said quickly. “He’s been moved to a regular room.”

“They tell him?”

Maura nodded with obvious reluctance. “He was wondering why you’d not been to visit.”

“Damn.”

“He’s doing well.” She turned slightly and something clinked beyond Jane’s line of vision. “Here.”

The plastic spoon touched Jane’s lips and she closed her eyes with relief as the ice chips soothed away the awful grating sensation in her throat. She wasn’t groggy enough not to recognize it as a distraction, but it felt so good that she really didn’t mind.

“What was the damage?” Another spoonful of melt-water slowly trickled down her throat as she watched Maura attempt to form a reply. The line in her neck tugged aggravatingly when she swallowed, something in her side pulled every time she breathed, and the simple act of keeping her eyes open for five minutes had exhausted her. She had really screwed up this time; what she needed to know was exactly how badly. “Maur, please?”

Maura set the cup and spoon down. “Okay.” She ran a hand through her hair, unsure where to start. The expression on Jane’s face told her just to start with the worst of it. “The bullet hit your liver, shattered three ribs, collapsed your lung, and caused massive bruising to your right kidney.” Her hand trembled as she indicated on her own body the track the bullet had taken. “You lost so much blood…” Her voice fell away and she shook her head. “You could’ve killed yourself.”

“I know.”

“Don’t ever do that again, will you?” Maura tried to smile but it came out all wrong, and she wiped her eyes dry with the back of her hand.

Not trusting herself to speak, Jane shook her head vehemently. The tubing in her neck pulled and stung fiercely, and an alarm squeaked in protest. She didn’t care.

~ ~ ~

“Good to see you awake, Detective.” The tall man in the scrubs smiled at Jane and then nodded at Maura as he ran a finger down a column of numbers pointed out to him by the nurse.

Watching him intently, Jane struggled to place his face. She vaguely recognized him, but a pounding headache was making it difficult for her to concentrate. She had initially blamed the headache on a visit from her mother that afternoon, but now, three hours later, she wasn’t so sure.

Noting her confusion, the surgeon took pity on her. “Doctor Gardner. I’m the one who patched you up.” When she offered him her hand, he shook it carefully.

“I owe you a beer, then. Soon as I get out of here.” She was trying to sit herself up in the bed, but the muscles in her arms felt like lead weights and she sagged back against the pillows to catch her breath. Undeterred, she arched an eyebrow at Gardner. “So, when do I get out of here?”

The I told you so look that Maura gave him was unmistakable. Jane narrowed her eyes at her friend as Maura shook her head hopelessly.

Determined to prove that she really was feeling better, Jane dug her heels into the bed, fully intent on pushing herself upright. She froze when pain suddenly bit into her torso. Drawing her legs up, she felt sweat break out on her forehead. “I’m gonna be sick.”

Maura was the first to react, stepping forward with a plastic bowl and holding it unflinchingly for her as she retched. There was barely anything to come up, and Jane shook her head in distress as the effort made the pain intensify.

“Oh God.” Maura cast a frantic look across to Gardner, who calmly adjusted a setting on the morphine pump before injecting a clear drug into one of the IVs.

“This will help with the nausea,” he said, “and that morphine should take about a minute to kick in, Jane.”

“Okay.” The word came out in a gasp. “Shit.” She looked up at Maura. “I don’t feel so good.” For a second she looked terrified, but she closed her eyes involuntarily as the drugs began to work.

Having set the bowl aside, Maura wiped Jane’s face clean, and then turned towards Gardner.

“She’s running a fever,” he said without preamble.

“I know.” He had only confirmed what Maura had already suspected; she could feel the heat of Jane’s skin beneath her hand. According to the monitor, Jane’s heart and respiration rate had both gradually accelerated over the past hour. Maura had noticed but remained silent when the nurse had quietly paged for assistance.

Working alongside the nurse, Gardner began adding medication to fresh IV bags before piggy-backing them onto already-established lines.

“We’ll give her a broad-spectrum antibiotic and IV acetaminophen to try and control her fever.” He signed an order for more medication and asked the nurse for blood cultures and wound swabs. “It’s possibly a transfusion reaction, but it’s more likely to be an infection. When we know what we’re dealing with, we can try to be more specific with the antibiotics.”

“How long will that take?” The clock on the wall told Maura it was 8.35, but for a disorienting moment she couldn’t work out whether it was evening or morning.

“It’ll take around four hours for the cultures to come back.”

“What can I do?” There was only practicality behind her question, and the surgeon’s expression softened.

“Try and keep her cool and quiet. Get her to drink a little if she’s able.” He increased the flow rate of an IV. “We’ll see how she responds to these. Her fever’s only mild at the moment, so hopefully we caught it in time.”

Maura nodded distractedly, her eyes fixed on the clear liquid dripping from the small bag of antibiotics. The door closed as the surgeon left the cubicle. Maura barely even blinked.


	4. Chapter 4

"I think – Maura, I can…" Jane scowled down at her hand where it lay limp and useless on the bed. "I can do this myself," she finished, her voice trailing away in futility when her arm steadfastly refused to obey her.

"Okay." Maura made her response sound entirely non-committal, but when she offered Jane the cloth Jane shook her head in defeat.

The nausea that had been tormenting her for hours crept up as an unwelcome distraction. Taking quick breaths through her mouth, she tried to control it, but the technique didn't work and she only just managed to lift the bowl before the spasms truly took hold. She shook her head, one hand clamped against her right side as pain wracked her. The onslaught seemed to last for an eternity, and when it finally relented tears were streaming down her face as she sobbed harshly.

"Shh." Maura smoothed the cloth across Jane's cheeks, brushing back tangled strands of hair. Although it felt wonderfully cold against her skin, Jane forced herself to reach up and still Maura's hand.

"You should go home," she whispered. "Please, Maura." She couldn't bear for anyone to see her like this, not even her best friend.

"I'm not leaving you." Maura laid Jane's hand down and the gentle motion of the cloth began again. "This is as bad as it's going to get and I've already seen it, so I guess you're stuck with me." She pressed a kiss to Jane's forehead, her thumb easing away the last of the tears as Jane relaxed under her touch. "You going to sleep?"

"Think so." The quietest of murmurs.

Maura straightened the sheets, refilled the cup of water, and retook her seat by Jane's side.

. . . . .

The scream was piercing and bordering on frantic. It tore Maura from her own uneasy sleep and brought her to the bedside, her heart thumping from a sudden surge of adrenaline.

"Dammit."

Crimson was leaking onto the sheets, spreading rapidly into the fibers like a Rorschach inkblot. She caught hold of Jane's wrist, wrapping her hand around the site from which Jane had ripped an IV. Beneath her fingers, Jane's entire arm tensed in an unconscious response to the sensation of being restrained.

"Jane, c'mon, honey. Wake up, you're safe. It's okay." Maura didn't really register what she was saying. The words were just a stream of platitudes, which continued until she felt Jane beginning to calm.

"Maura?" Abruptly Jane stopped struggling, and her eyes, still glazed with sleep, opened wide. She eventually managed to focus on Maura's hand where it was clasped around her wrist. "Shit. Sorry." She couldn't remember the dream, but the feeling of terror it had instilled lingered even now, making her shiver.

"You with me?" Maura reached for a wad of gauze, using it to try to stem the bleeding, and then pressed the button for the nurse.

"Yeah, I'm with you. I'm gonna be sick, but I'm with you." Jane held the bowl miserably as her stomach clenched.

A flash of red on the monitor caught Maura's eye. Noting the drop in Jane's blood pressure, she pressed the call alarm again.

Sensibly, the nurse brought a doctor with her. In a matter of minutes, another IV had been started and fresh antibiotics prescribed. The doctor took one look at her patient and then added a new drug to the chart.

"This is just going to help you get some rest, Jane."

A flush of warmth spread out from Jane's wrist and she blinked up at the doctor. "You slip me a mickey?" Her speech was already slurred and her body felt light enough to float. For the first time in hours, the nausea seemed to fade into the background.

"Well, yes, in a manner of speaking." The doctor's entirely unrepentant tone made Jane smile.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome. Can you keep that IV in long enough for those antibiotics to run through?"

"I'll try."

The doctor laughed quietly, waiting until Jane's eyes closed and her breathing evened out before turning to Maura.

"She gave you a scare, huh?"

"Yes, it's sort of a habit of hers." Maura slumped back into her chair, feeling as exhausted as Jane looked.

"I'll bet," the doctor said wryly. "Her temperature is actually a little lower. Those antibiotics are pretty much designed to kick most things in the ass, so hopefully she'll be a lot brighter when the sedative wears off."

Leaning forward with her chin resting on her steepled fingers, Maura watched Jane as she slept peacefully. "What the hell did you give her?"

"Midazolam. It's great stuff. Won't last for long but it should be enough to see her through the worst of this infection. If I were you, I'd take the opportunity to grab a hot meal, have a shower, and then get some sleep yourself."

"Sounds good." Maura wasn't entirely sure she had the energy to do anything except the last of those suggestions.

"I'll be back in a half-hour to check on her."

"Thank you."

Certain that Maura would still be there when she returned, the doctor dimmed the lights on her way out of the room.

. . . . .

Waking up seemed to be taking an awful lot of time and effort, and for a while Jane was content to hover in a kind of in-between state. Her eyes would open, her senses would begin to pick up smells and sounds, and then her eyes would roll, pulling her back into the dark. When this happened for the fifth time, she decided to move things along a little and intentionally dug her fingernails into the soft flesh of her palm. The resulting sting of discomfort was enough to force her eyes open and keep them open.

Without making a sound, she turned her head to the right and found Maura, curled up into a reclining chair, deeply asleep, her eyelids flickering rapidly as she dreamed. Lying completely still so as not to disturb her, Jane took the opportunity to perform a rough top-to-toe inventory of herself. The fact that she was finally alert enough to do this was the first thing she realized. When she then added the lack of nausea to the clear head, she knew that her fever had broken and allowed herself a couple of seconds simply to be relieved. Although aware that she still had a long way to go before she was fully recovered, battling through the infection was a massive hurdle to have gotten over. Despite the delirium that had kept her half-crazed, she remembered how scared she had been that perhaps this was something she just didn't have the strength to fight off.

Pushing the thought aside, she took a couple of breaths, making them as deep as she dared. The pain in her chest and abdomen was like an aggravating toothache – constant and uncomfortable but nothing that she couldn't bear. She licked her lips. They were dry and cracked and her tongue felt horrible. Seconds later, the thirst hit her.

"Jesus." Barely a whisper, not enough to disturb Maura.

She stared at the wall, trying to ignore the nagging sensation, but in her peripheral vision she could see the cup with its straw dangling enticingly and the jug of water sitting an arm's length away on the bedside table. Ice had melted in the glass jug, coating the outside with glistening droplets, and what had started out as a pang developed incrementally into full-blown torture.

Her hand trembled as it reached out, the muscles in her arm stiff and weakened by inactivity. Inch by inch her fingers crept towards their goal, and when they eventually touched the smooth plastic of the cup she felt like she had completed the marathon all over again.

"C'mon…" She managed to wrap her hand around the cup, lifting it carefully free of the table and raising it to her lips. The straw wobbled but didn't fall. Opening her mouth, she tried to keep the cup steady and aim the straw between her lips. Dexterity, motor control, and luck all failed her simultaneously. Instead of going in her mouth, the straw tickled her nose, and she closed her eyes in dismay seconds before she sneezed. She let out a hoarse half-laugh, half-cry of despair, her free hand splinting her side as the water sloshed down her neck and Maura – startled awake – stared at her in bewilderment.

"Crap."

"You know you're wearing most of that, don't you?" Having worked out exactly what had gone on, Maura was trying to keep a straight face.

"I had noticed, yeah."

Taking the cup from her, Maura topped it up and guided the straw to her lips. "Not too fast, you'll make yourself sick."

Jane nodded, her eyes half-lidded with pleasure. The water was slightly stale but it tasted as good as any beer she had ever had. As she drank, Maura's hand rested first on her forehead and then her cheek.

"You feel cooler."

"Mmm."

"Feeling better?"

"Mmhm." It wasn't really an answer but the tone sounded affirmative.

"Okay, I'm going to take that as a yes. Will you wake me up next time you need something?"

The water finished, Jane quirked an eyebrow as the straw made rude sucking sounds against the base of the cup.

"Okay." Maura shrugged. "I'm also going to take that as a yes…"

. . . . .

The tiny hollow tube slid from Jane's wrist with only the faintest of pinches, and she obediently kept her arm still as the nurse wrapped a dressing neatly into place.

"Feel okay?"

"Feels fine, thanks."

"Try not to move it around too much for the next hour or so. The line was arterial, so if it bleeds you'll know about it."

"No problem."

Her patient's compliance seemed to catch the nurse a little off-guard, but she collected all the clinical waste together and left the cubicle.

Jane waited until the door closed and then turned to Maura. "Honey, I think it's time you went home for a while."

Lowering the journal from behind which she had been surreptitiously observing the proceedings, Maura frowned. "You don't want me here?" She sounded slightly hurt.

"No, it's not that." Jane opened her hands, searching for the right thing to say. "I just… how long has it been?"

"Six days." Maura was able to answer with confidence because she had had a very similar conversation with Frost barely two hours earlier.

"Six days? Jesus." Jane could only recall two of them with any clarity. She stared in astonishment at her friend, not quite wanting to believe exactly how long Maura had stayed with her, but as she took the time to look closely she realized the evidence was plain to see. The skin beneath Maura's eyes was so dark it appeared almost bruised and yet she had made no effort to conceal it with make-up. Her hair lay unstyled and limp around her face, and the top half of her scrubs was mismatched with the bottom. Even without the trappings of professionalism and fashion that she tended to hide herself behind, she still looked beautiful, and Jane smiled softly, a flutter in her chest increasing her heart rate from a steady green number to a slightly faster amber on the monitor.

Self-conscious beneath Jane's unflinching scrutiny, Maura nervously tucked an errant strand of hair behind her ear. "Are you okay?" she asked, not quite able to decipher the expression on Jane's face and beginning to worry.

"Fine." Jane quickly averted her eyes, her tone giving nothing away. Unable or unwilling to elaborate, she fell back on her theory that sometimes it was safest just to change the subject. "Doctor Isles, don't you have dead people you should be cutting up?"

"I took some vacation time that I've been owed for a while now." Maura's answer was matter-of-fact; going back to work hadn't really been an option for her.

"You're spending your vacation in here?" Horrified at the notion, Jane gripped her hand. "That's time you should be spending on a tropical beach somewhere."

"I'm not really one for tropical beaches, Jane. Sand getting in everywhere, sunburn, dehydration, malaria, giardiasis…"

Jane had no clue what the last one was, but the look of disgust on Maura's face told her that it wasn't pleasant. "Maura, you've just spent the last twenty-four hours watching me vomit."

"Yes, well, at least you weren't contagious."

Aware that she wasn't going to win this one, Jane opted for a compromise. "As convincing an argument as that is, I still think it's time you got out of the scrubs. It's not like I'm going anywhere and I promise I'll behave myself. Please?"

After a few seconds of deliberation, Maura nodded reluctantly. She had to admit that the idea of wearing something other than second-hand clothing was very appealing.

"You won't try to escape while I'm gone?"

As if to emphasize the non-existent likelihood of that happening, Jane raised her hands. Although she had gotten rid of one IV line, she remained attached to a further two.

"All right." Maura was somewhat placated by Jane's sincerity but also privately grateful that she was still essentially tethered to the bed. "I won't be long."

"Okay." For a fleeting moment Jane looked a little lost, and Maura was on the verge of reconsidering when Jane shook her head as if giving herself a mental pep-talk. "Go on, get out of here."

"You want me to bring you anything back?"

"Keg of beer and some solid food, thanks."

"I'm sure those would go wonderfully with your anti-emetics."

"My anti-what now?"

"Anti-emetics, Jane. They're the reason you no longer need that little bowl every five minutes."

"I love Doctor-speak," Jane said with barely a hint of sarcasm. "Seriously, I can't get enough of it."

Maura narrowed her eyes. "I think that's my cue to leave." Even from the door Maura could see Jane's teeth working furiously on her bottom lip. "You sure about this?"

"Yes."

"Call the nurses if you need anything."

"I will."

"Okay then." Maura felt as nervous as Jane looked. Turning away from the bed, she left the room before she could change her mind.

As Maura's footsteps faded, Jane ran her tongue across the small hole she had made in her bottom lip, tasting blood. She took a few sips of water from the cup that Maura had moved to within easy reach of her, rinsed her mouth clean and set the cup down. Then she shifted herself over to the left, relieving the pressure on a sore spot and pretty much accomplishing everything on her To Do list.

She already knew that there were twenty-eight ceiling tiles, because she had counted them earlier that day to stop herself from swearing at the nurse who was changing her dressings. Having decided that sleep would be an excellent way to pass the time, she closed her eyes and willed herself to feel drowsy. Five minutes later, a muttered string of expletives heralded the abandonment of that idea. Her fingers toyed with the call button as she debated whether or not boredom was an acceptable reason to press it. Deciding that it probably wasn't, she set it down again. Eight drops of saline passed into her IV in fifteen seconds. With nothing better to do and time to kill, Jane's sole source of entertainment came from working out how long it would be before her current IV needed changing, and trying to predict whether or not Maura would be back before then.

. . . . .

Her arms laden with bags, Maura stood in the doorway of Jane's ICU cubicle and stared in horror at the empty bed.

"Oh no…" Her vision swam and she leaned heavily against the door jamb. She had only been gone for two hours. Time enough for her to call at her own house and Jane's apartment. Time enough for…

"Maura?" Footsteps hurried towards her and she spun around. "God, honey, I'm sorry. We were looking out for you but Mr Hobson coded." The nurse sounded mortified. "Jane's fine. They've moved her to a High Dependency bed." Concerned by Maura's pallor and the fact that she was barely able to stay on her feet, the nurse reached out and set her shopping bags down before ushering her into the nearest chair. "I'm so sorry you got such a fright."

Her head bent low, Maura tried to ignore the panicky sensation in her chest and focused instead on breathing normally. "She's okay?" she said at last as the room finally stopped spinning.

"She's fine. She's also very impressed that her new room has a TV and a window."

Maura's laugh sounded suspiciously like a sob.

"Come on." The nurse helped her to her feet. "It's just next door, but I'll walk you over there."

. . . . .

As soon as Jane saw Maura she dropped her cell phone, shook her head in silent apology, and held her arms out.

"I've been trying to call you but this damn thing won't work properly in here."

Maura didn't speak; she just sank into Jane's arms and tried to stop herself from shivering.

"The nurses promised me they'd tell you."

"It wasn't their fault, someone coded on the unit." Maura pulled away slightly and raised her hand to Jane's cheek as if to reassure herself once and for all that everything really was okay. When Jane caught hold of her hand and interlaced their fingers, Maura felt the tension begin to drain away and was able to take a minute to survey their new surroundings.

"So, you got a TV, then?"

"Yes, finally I can watch Dancing with the Stars."

"You hate Dancing with the Stars."

Jane grinned. "I know, but I like to have the option of swearing at it and then switching it off. Oh," she gestured to the small window on her left, "check out my view."

"It's a rooftop covered in bird excrement."

"Gah, you're so literal. I can see what the weather's like, Maur. Six days without seeing the sky…" Jane's voice was bright with genuine excitement and it made Maura smile. After spending six days in the unit herself, swapping the antiseptic smell of the hospital for fresh air had been a simple but real pleasure.

"It's sunny today, clear blue skies."

Her eyes growing heavy, Jane shuffled down a little in the bed but gestured to Maura to continue.

"It's still warm, but the leaves are just beginning to turn, reds and oranges creeping into the green. I think it'll only take one good sharp frost and we'll have a beautiful fall." Maura paused, listening as Jane's breathing gradually settled into a deep, regular rhythm. Still holding her hand loosely, Maura stayed where she was, perched on the bed and watching the light fade over the rooftops as her friend slept.


	5. Chapter 5

The three little balls bobbed pathetically in the clear plastic box and Jane snarled in frustration as she ran out of breath.

"Fuck." When she spat the tube from her mouth, the balls floated back to the bottom of their individual compartments where they sat in silent judgment waiting for her to try again. "Fuck." Designed to improve her lung function, the exercise was the latest torture device inflicted upon her by her physical therapist. In the last hour, Jane had decided that she hated it far more passionately than coughing, deep breathing, and sitting upright in a chair. She pulled in ragged breaths until the pain in her chest began to ease. When it settled to a tolerable level, she opted to look on the bright side; at least her battle with the damn thing was helping to pass the time. Sealing her lips around the tube once more, she began to exhale.

In preparation for a homicide case about to go to trial, Maura had gone to her office to finalize her case notes and ensure that her assistant was prepared for his testimony. Consequently, Jane had been alone for most of the day. Having been moved from the HDU into a regular room, she had insisted that Maura start going home more often, but Maura was still officially on vacation, and seemed perfectly content to spend most of her time and the occasional night in the hospital.

The first ball began to sink as Jane glanced furtively at the clock. With a huff she refloated it, but her chest was burning again and sweat was running down from her forehead to sting her eyes. After another couple of seconds she gave up, dropping the contraption onto the bed as she struggled to catch her breath. Light-headed and sickly, she curled her hands into fists, infuriated by her own weakness. She had been in the hospital for almost two weeks now, and she couldn't even get out of bed without two people standing by to help her.

Determined not to give in, her fingers were inching towards the tube again when she heard the knock at the door.

"Uh, come in?" Puzzled, Jane looked up. Maura rarely, if ever, knocked. A nurse had only just taken Jane's vitals and she wasn't expecting any visitors.

The door opened slowly and awkwardly as if something was in the way. There was a muffled yelp of pain and a short burst of apologetic laughter, and Jane felt her pulse quicken as she recognized both voices.

"Hey." Standing behind the wheelchair, Maura was beaming from ear to ear. "Look who I found."

"Hey, Janie."

"Hey." Jane's eyes filled with tears as she smiled at her brother. Frankie managed to stand up, taking the hand she held out and then hugging her tightly as she pulled him close. For a long moment neither of them moved, but then she pushed him upright a little, studying every part of his face and pressing her hands to his chest as if to reassure herself that he really was there and still in one piece.

"I think I got off lightly compared to you, sis."

He brushed her hair away from her face, trying to hide his reaction as he noticed how much weight she had lost. Bruises from IVs stood out starkly on her wrists and forearms, emphasizing not only how critically ill she had been but how pale she still was.

"I didn't know what else to do," she whispered. "I just…" Her voice broke and she shook her head. "It seemed like the only option at the time."

"Hell of a gamble," he said mildly.

"Yeah, it was."

"I really appreciate what you were trying to do, Janie, but promise me you won't ever do it again."

"I won't. I already promised Maura."

He tipped her chin with his hand. "Promise me."

"I promise."

Relief lightened his expression and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Love you."

"Love you too."

. . . . .

"Creamed potato." Jane screwed her eyes shut and stuck her tongue out like a kid taking her first taste of medicine. "Full of lumps and how the fuck do they get it that funny shade of gray?"

"I wouldn't like to guess." Frankie sounded as if he had already given the matter some serious deliberation. "But even that's not as bad as those nasty little pudding cups I get every night."

She laughed. "I kinda like those."

"Oh God, you can't! They're horrible."

Maura sheepishly raised her hand. "I kinda like those too, especially the chocolate one."

Frankie stared at them and then shook his head sadly. "You need help, both of you." He ducked away as Jane swatted his arm. "But, oh, hey, did I tell you I'm getting out of here tomorrow?"

"Yes you did, three times already." Jane's second swat was more forceful than her first.

"Ow! You always did have a jealous streak, Janie."

"Yeah, well, at least when I go home I'll be taking all of my vital organs with me."

Frankie looked suitably appalled as his sister smirked and raised an eyebrow in challenge at him, but the confidence slowly faded from her face as doubt crept in. She turned to consult Maura in a stage whisper. "I have still got all my organs, haven't I?"

"Yes, apparently the chunk you ripped out of your liver will grow back just fine." Maura's voice was dryer than the Sahara, but Jane merely gave her brother a triumphant thumbs-up.

There wasn't much Frankie could say in response, and he cheerfully conceded defeat with a kiss on her cheek. "You'll be out raising hell soon enough."

"Yeah, I hope so."

"In the meantime…" He gave her his best mournful look. "You wanna take Ma for a while?" Jane was already shaking her head vehemently. "C'mon Janie, she's driving me mad. She keeps trying to make me drink that potion she's been hawking."

"She keeps threatening to bring Father Crowley in to counsel me."

"Shit." Frankie winced. "Never did forgive you for dropping out of Catechism class, did she?"

"Nope."

"Guess I should be grateful the juice is all she's bringing me, huh?"

"I think so, yeah."

"Tastes like crap."

"Father Crowley is eighty-nine years old," Jane said pleasantly, "and stone-deaf."

Frankie was trying and failing not to laugh. "Okay, you win. I'm gonna stick with the juice."

. . . . .

Jane's knuckles were whiter than the porcelain sink she was clinging onto. An hour ago, she would've traded almost anything to finally have a proper shower but now, waiting for the nurse to finish toweling her dry, she was no longer sure it had been such a good idea.

"You okay?"

"Fine." Her answer came automatically, but she squeezed her eyes closed and willed her legs to remain steady beneath her.

"Almost finished." Leaving a wide margin around the exit wound, the nurse tentatively patted the skin on Jane's back, but even that delicate touch was agonizing, and Jane felt her legs beginning to give way. Fortunately the nurse felt it too. "Okay, easy. Sit down on here." She guided Jane to sit on the closed toilet seat and wiped the cold sweat from her patient's face without comment. "I just need to collect a couple of dressing packs. You safe on there for a minute?"

"I'm good, thanks."

Leaving the washroom door ajar, the nurse hurried through Jane's room and out into the corridor. Naked beneath the towel, Jane shivered as a cool breeze drifted in. When she leaned forward to push the door closed, her towel slipped slightly and the clouded reflection in the mirror opposite caught her eye. Without a thought for modesty she cast the towel aside and struggled back to her feet. The glass of the mirror was half-concealed by steam which she used her hand and then the towel to clear.

"Jesus." The curse left her in a rush of breath.

Despite dozens of dressing changes, she had only ever been able to see the wound on her abdomen. The exit wound on her back had remained hidden from her, and she had never asked for details, had never wanted to know exactly how bad it was. Crystal clear thanks to her efforts with the towel, the mirror revealed the wound in graphic detail. The patch of discoloration on her abdomen tracked around to her upper back where it became more swollen and took on several deeper shades of purple. The wound itself was a mess of ripped flesh that had been tugged together by a haphazard collection of sutures. There was no order or pattern to them, and the havoc wrought by the bullet exploding away from her was plain to see. The doctors had told her that she had been fortunate to survive, but until now she had never truly appreciated just how close a call it had been.

"You're going to get cold, Jane."

The voice wasn't the one Jane had been expecting, and its gentle tone unintentionally destroyed the thread of composure she had barely been hanging onto. Maura didn't say another word, but just wrapped a dry robe around Jane's shoulders and then wrapped her arms around Jane as she wept. Jane never had been one for self-pity and it didn't take long for her sobs to taper off, but when they did they seemed to take with them what little energy she had had left. She allowed Maura to lead her back to her room and sit her on the edge of the bed. Two dressing packs had been left unobtrusively on the side table and Maura silently thanked the absent nurse for her tact.

"It's going to scar, isn't it?" Jane's voice was even more hoarse than usual, leaving her question barely audible as if she wasn't sure she wanted an answer.

Maura saw nothing to be gained by subterfuge. "Yes, it is."

"Shit."

"It'll fade, Jane, given enough time. No one will know it's there."

"You'll know."

Maura cupped Jane's cheek with one hand and felt the faint pressure returned as Jane leaned into it. "Yes, but I won't tell anybody. Here…"

The Boston P.D. t-shirt was over-sized and shapeless but it smelled of home; Jane gave a murmur of gratitude as Maura helped her slip it over her head. It fell long and baggy, effectively covering everything that she didn't want to think about.

"Better?"

"God, yes."

She waited patiently for Maura to thread her bare feet into her sweat pants and surprised herself by managing to stand unaided while they were pulled up. After a wary knock, the nurse entered the room, and although Jane held onto Maura's hand she lay without complaint as clean dressings were sealed into place.

"Comfortable?"

Easing herself onto her back again, Jane nodded at the nurse.

"Good. You know where I am if you need anything."

"Thank you."

A rustling noise at the bottom of the bed distracted Jane and she looked up to see Maura wrestling two tubs of ice cream from a paper bag.

"I think I love you." Jane took the tub of Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough with the enthusiasm she traditionally reserved for kicking a perp's door in. "What'd you get?" she mumbled around a huge mouthful. "Oh, gross."

"I know you hate it," Maura said, smugly displaying her choice of Häagen-Dazs Strawberry Cheesecake, "which means you won't be tempted to try and steal it when you finish yours."

"Sneaky, very sneaky, Doctor Isles." Jane sounded genuinely impressed as she scraped the lid of her tub clean. "So, what we watchin'?"

In an effort to prevent Jane from succumbing to cabin fever, Maura had brought her own DVD player in from home and hooked it up to the hospital television.

"Now, that was a bit more difficult." Maura looked vaguely apologetic. "I took a wild guess and decided you wouldn't be interested in Italian Neorealism or Ingmar Bergman's oeuvre, which pretty much ruled out every movie I own. So I borrowed this from Jack, that nurse who's just started on the night shift. He said it's great." She held up the DVD case of 300 for Jane to see as she studied the blurb on the back. "Um, okay, despite sounding historically interesting, it seems to comprise a cast of three-hundred well-oiled, well-defined men running around in little to no clothing…"

Digging into her tub of ice cream, Jane wrestled with a chunk of cookie dough and managed to look singularly unenthused.

Continuing to read, Maura reached the cast list and cleared her throat. "Oh, Lena Headey's in it as well," she noted nonchalantly.

The spoon half-way to her mouth, Jane hesitated, considering this latest development with her head tilted. "Huh," she said in a pitch-perfect match of Maura's nonchalant tone, as she licked vanilla droplets from her fingers. "Well, if you're sure there isn't anything else on…"

. . . . .

The hiss of the pressure being released seemed terribly loud in the quiet of the hospital room.

"Crap. Think anyone heard that?" Korsak paused, his shoulders hunched protectively over his illicit stash as he listened and waited for the raid he was sure would follow.

"No one heard it." Jane gestured impatiently. "C'mon, hand it over."

For a few seconds she just held the bottle of beer, savoring its damp chill against her palm, the sound of the bubbles fizzing and popping, and the familiar bitter smell of hops. She grinned as Frost clinked his bottle against hers and Korsak followed suit, and then she took her first drink.

"Fuck, that tastes good." Relaxing against her pillows, she sighed contentedly.

Maura had been turning a blind eye to the proceedings, but something suddenly occurred to her and she fixed Jane with a look. "You know alcohol and pain meds don't mix, Jane." She arched an eyebrow. "So exactly how long have you been skipping your pain meds for?"

Jane heard Korsak and Frost both suck in a breath and she swore inaudibly beneath hers. "Uh. Hmm. Not long?" Maura's expression told her that wasn't a good enough answer and she decided just to come clean. "About three days." She swallowed more beer, wondering how quickly she could get drunk and realizing as the alcohol filtered noticeably into her system that the answer was probably: quite quickly.

"Jane…"

"They make me so tired all the time," Jane protested, before adding quietly, "I'm sick of being sick, Maur."

"I know you are." Maura's voice no longer held an edge; she wasn't Jane's minder and had no intention of nagging her friend into submission. Paying heed to the maxim if you can't beat 'em, join 'em, she accepted a bottle from Korsak and tapped it against Jane's. "Cheers."

Jane nodded, grateful for the reprieve. "Cheers."

"So, they give you any idea when they're kicking you out of here?" Korsak asked as he efficiently distributed small packets of pretzels.

"Hopefully later this week." Without pausing for thought, Jane swapped her packet of regular for the sour cream and onion that Maura hated. "The Brass are making me see a shrink before they'll clear me for active duty." She popped a pretzel into her mouth. "Apparently shooting yourself to stop the bad guy isn't considered an acceptable method of apprehension."

Frost cocked his head on one side as if mentally working his way through an imaginary manual. "Y'know, come to think of it, I don't remember that being covered by basic training."

Jane threw a pretzel at his head and took a quick sip of her beer before her smile faded completely. The mandatory debrief and recommendation for psychological assessment hadn't come as a surprise, but psychiatrists and counseling inevitably raised the subject of Charles Hoyt, which was never something that she relished picking apart with a complete stranger.

"So," she forced brightness into her voice, refusing to allow that bastard to creep into her thoughts and sink her mood, "what have I been missing? Maura told me you caught a shout the other night."

Taking her cue, Korsak leaned forward in his chair. "Fuck, Rizzoli, this one was a mess," he said with relish and with one gleeful eye on Frost. "Drug dealer, been dead in his lock-up for about ten days. Body had bloated up like a whale, skin slipping and crawling with maggots." He wiggled his fingers as if the image needed further elucidation. "And the smell, you know that smell…"

Jane nodded as Frost set his bottle down and began to swallow convulsively.

"…Sweet and foul all at the same time," Korsak continued, pretending to be oblivious to Frost's discomfiture and fooling absolutely no one.

Scowling at Korsak, Maura passed Frost an emesis bowl. He took it and made a bolt for Jane's washroom, desperate to try to preserve what little remained of his dignity.

Jane waited until the door slammed shut. "God, I miss being at work," she said without a hint of irony, and reached for another beer.

. . . . .

The breeze carried with it the scent of rain and of fumes from the traffic snarled up on the parking lots. Car horns blared, voicing their owners' impatience as people rushed to escape the confines of the hospital's infrastructure now that their shifts had ended. Her hands tucked deeply into the pockets of a thick sweater, Jane ignored the chaos and filled her lungs with air that didn't stink of disinfectant and sickness as Maura wheeled her into the relative quiet of the hospital's small garden.

"I think I got it from here, Maur."

"You sure?"

Jane licked her lips nervously. The bench was a good ten yards away. "Sort of."

Securing the brakes on the wheelchair, Maura moved round in front of it and handed Jane the stick her physical therapist had given her to mobilize with.

"I got it," Jane said again, in an undertone that was mainly aimed at convincing herself.

Her feet flat on the ground, she pushed up with her legs, using her arms as counter-balance and trying to keep the effort from tearing at her abdominal muscles. It hurt, it always hurt, but she ignored the sweat that was dampening the back of her t-shirt and focused instead on how good it felt to be vertical.

The late afternoon sun peeked out from behind a mass of bulging cloud as she took her first shaky steps towards the bench. Concentrating on its thin warmth against her face and on Maura's murmur of encouragement, she placed her stick carefully and began to find a slow but steady rhythm.

"Can't believe I ran a marathon a few months ago." Her legs felt like Bambi-legs, feeble and ready to fold at a moment's notice.

"It's going to take time, Jane."

Jane glanced sharply at her friend. "How much time?" She stabbed the stick down and bit back a moan as the impact reverberated in her chest. Panting and waiting for the pain die down a little, she nevertheless heard Maura's practical answer.

"Longer than three weeks."

"I know." Her shoulders sagged. There was no point in being angry and even less point in directing that anger towards Maura. "Sorry." She set off slowly again. "I don't mean to be a bitch."

"I think under the circumstances you're allowed to be a bitch occasionally."

Jane grinned. "Oh, thank fuck for that." Her relief was two-fold as the bench came within touching distance. She made a grab for its arm, lowering herself onto it with a muted "yay".

Sitting down beside Jane, Maura wrapped her arms across herself to ward off the increasing chill and rustled her feet in the leaf litter. Above them, bird song filtered in from the tree canopy, drowning out the bad-tempered rush hour and the wail of approaching sirens.

Jane began to shiver. She shuffled closer to Maura and leaned into her.

"We should be getting back." Tucking her arm around Jane, Maura showed no sign of doing anything of the sort.

"Mmm."

"You're shivering."

"Stopped now."

"Okay." Maura drew her closer. "Five more minutes."

"Five more minutes," Jane agreed, and then shook her head as she started to laugh. "Y'never know, Maura, if I set off walking then, I might be back in my room by midnight."

. . . . .

The automatic doors swished time after time as people hurried in and out of the main entrance. The worry on those faces rushing to see loved ones was plain to see, as was the exhaustion on those at the beginning or end of another long shift. A couple passing by recognized Jane and wished her well. Jane nodded her thanks and tried not to show how nervous she was. She wanted to go home more than anything, but now that she was poised at the threshold of the hospital she appreciated exactly what a safe haven it had provided for the last three weeks.

For three weeks she had lived by the hospital's routine. She had eaten and been medicated and had therapy according to an established timetable. Help had been no more than the press of a button away, and the nurses had instinctively known which visitors got to break the rules and which were to be politely but firmly moved on after a couple of hours.

"You ready?"

Jane was staring at her father's car maneuvering awkwardly into a parking bay, and startled slightly at Maura's question. After a moment of deliberation she looked up and nodded.

"Yeah, I'm ready."

She gripped the arms of the wheelchair and stood up. Immediately beyond the door three steps loomed ominously, and she hesitated, suddenly even more uncertain. Maura's arm slipped beneath hers and Jane felt Maura squeeze her hand.

"Just lean on me," Maura said softly.

Her nerves instantly banished, Jane smiled at her friend. "I always do," she whispered.

She curled her fingers around Maura's and they stepped outside.


End file.
